Mysterious Ways
by Squire
Summary: Shannon and Boone search for answers. Will the long-held secrets and the island destroy them?


Hi!

This is my first LOST fanfic. It features just Boone and Shannon for now, but will incorporate more of the cast in later chapters. No couples...yet!

I'd love to know what you think of it!

Mysterious Ways (1/?)

Lady

The characters and situations from LOST do not belong to me. I'm just borrowing them for a short while!

PG

Shannon and Boone search for answers. Will the long-held secrets and the island destroy them?

Shannon's POV

Everyone thinks I'm useless but that's not the case at all. I deciphered the transmission even though I was in shock.

After we'd heard the voice, I pulled Boone aside. "Could it have been?" I asked in shock.

His expression looked grim. "Yes, Shannon. It was. I don't know how…" He'd hugged me tight and for a moment we were bound by the same history that always pushed us apart.

Of course I knew French. I'd taken it in some weird screwed up tribute to the one who had abandoned us. As if she'd love us enough to come back or something. Boone and I had carried the hurt of her abandonment all of our lives. It was something we were like a favorite T-shirt or a well-worn pair of low-rise jeans. Our father told us that she and Alex were gone and the hurt just made more sense. The alternatives hurt even worse. If she had made a life somewhere far away, if she'd preferred to be married to her science instead of our father, if she'd just not wanted to be a mom anymore, that we dealt with. It made Boone bitter and angry with a screwed up sense of family duty and it made me act like I didn't care about much.

Not caring was easier than caring too much. Our mother had broken our souls when she left and took our little brother. I was only ten, and Boone was just fourteen that terrible day. Dad had come home to see a letter from her, saying she'd taken Alex and gone on some expedition to the South Pacific.

Dad and Boone had huddled together for hours, but I'd been kept out of the discussion…

April, 1988

"Shanny, go amuse yourself. I need to talk to your brother." My father's voice sounded so upset after he read the note on the kitchen table and so sad. I ran over to give him a hug but Boone stepped in the way, looking mean.

"F-fine." I didn't know why my voice shook. I stopped in front of Alex's room and looked inside. The closet was open…and empty. I bit my lip. Something was very wrong. His Legos weren't on the floor and his favorite stuffed animals weren't around. The room looked empty. I ran over to the bed and buried my head in Alex's pillow. It smelled of him, all four-year-old boy but the pain in my chest told me he wasn't here anymore.

"M-mom?" I moved quickly to my parents' bedroom. The closet door was open there as well and her side of the closet was empty. I started getting really scared and ran into the bathroom. There! Some of her makeup was there. Even though tears were running down my face, I applied all the makeup I could find very carefully and sprayed myself with all of her perfume.

When I was done, I studied my face in the mirror. It didn't look very good, I knew, but it was a part of Mommy and I wanted to keep that close.

"Boone? Daddy?" I walked out to find them sitting very close together on the couch. Their expressions made me more worried, but I walked up to them, trying to smile. "How do I look?"

"You idiot!" Boone had never roared at me like that before and I started crying even harder. He yanked my arm painfully and dragged me to the bathroom. He wasn't gentle at all when he washed my face.

"Mom's gone and she took Alex with her." He had no emotion in his voice, not even sadness. "She's never coming back, Shannon. Never. Don't ever talk to Dad about them again or we might lose him too."

I was confused. "Mommy's gone? Where? Why would she go and why did she take Alex? Boone, I'm scared."

My brother seemed normal again when he sat me down on the toilet seat and smoothed my damp hair back. "Dad said she went across the world to do experiments." He looked down. "I guess she didn't love us enough to stay."

I chewed my lip and tried to understand but it seemed too strange. Moms didn't leave their kids. Not nice moms and our mom was the nicest. "Boone…I'm scared." I put my hand in his. "Don't leave me alone."

He gave me a big hug. "Don't worry, Shanny, whatever happens we have each other. I'll always protect you, no matter what."

I shook my head, shaking off the memories but they wouldn't go away. So many questions…

A month earlier

"Do we have to do this, Shannon? You start your new job in a couple of weeks and I don't have much vacation time life. Why do you have to keep chasing ghosts?"

I turned to face my brother. Some days he was a stranger but he was all I had since dad had died four years ago. "The detective said that he had someone matching the aged pictures of Alex we had done. It's identical, even the little birthmark on his shoulder. I have to find out, Boone. You can stay or you can go, but I have to do this."

My brother sighed and gave me "the look". That look always caused me to roll my eyes but today I wasn't about to pull his attention away from this discussion. Boone had found it easier to put thoughts of Mom and Alex aside, but I had always hoped and wanted to find them. After Dad died, I hired a private investigator to find our family. The first stop had been Tahiti, and the second Australia, where he'd had a bit of luck.

"Boone, look at the picture." I shoved the grainy photo under my brother's nose. "Doesn't it look like Alex?"

My strong brother shuddered and nodded. "Fine, I'll make the arrangements. Shan…I hope we're not chasing rainbows."

"Me too."

I had been thinking about that voice a lot. When Sayid had tried to locate it, I almost had a hope that we'd find a body. Find something, some reminder of who she had been. Who they had been. Then Sayid left and Boone and I were trapped in our private hell again, a hell of hopes and wishes, of mysteries and fairy tales that could never be.

So I tamped down my hope in a sea of attitude and selfishness and tried not to think about what we'd lost. It was easier to be the vacant self-absorbed blonde anyway.


End file.
